Full title: Fukushima disaster: Plan to send residents home three years after nuclear accident labelled 'irresponsible' A nuclear industry insider has told the ABC that the situation at the stricken Fukushima reactor is still not under control, three years after the disaster there.

Japan's prime minister Shinzo Abe has announced he wants 30,000 residents to return to their homes and the reactors to be switched back on within two years.

SNIP

At the risk of losing his job if his identity is revealed, a senior TEPCO staffer, who has worked at the Fukushima plant for more than 20 years, says the situation at the reactor is not under control and no-one knows how to fix the problem.

"There are too many systems and they all have problems," he said.

"For example, too many water tanks with too many lines - it's very difficult to operate. It's made worse because all the experienced workers have reached their radiation limits, so TEPCO has to rely on staff that don't know the site and who aren't trained." Audio: Listen to Mathew Carney's report for PM (PM)

The whistleblower says mistakes are made weekly, and contaminated water leaks into the Pacific Ocean every day.

"The other day when contaminated water overflowed from a tank, an alarm was ringing but they didn't go and check. I couldn't believe it. It was ringing for nine hours and they thought the alarm was out of order."

The insider says the damaged reactors can never be decontaminated and that people should not be moved back into the no-go zone, a 20-kilometre exclusion area around Fukushima.

"I feel it is impossible to fix before my death," he said.

"We just don't have the technology to fix it. It currently doesn't exist. We just can't deal with the melted fuel."

The PM is saying absolute trash and he knows it. Good grief. That place will be uninhabitable for longer than decades and the cleanup and containment will take decades.

the black dust they find all over the country is full of plutonium and americium, which is stuff that if it gets in your body, stays there forever and radiates you.

they are in extreme, extreme denial over there. it’s totally damaged any chances to fix stuff and reduce the severity of the problem. lots of areas in japan are going to be very dangerous to live because of their denial and head-in-the-sand tactics.

not like the media here and government here are not underplaying it, they certainly are. but the japanese have that whole honor/save face crap that we don’t that forces people here to deal with reality and truth because others demand it.

Abe - the bastard - member of the supposedly “ conservative “ LDP , who last year agreed to raising the Japanese “ consumption “ tax from 5 to 8 percent starting next month , and then to 10% next year . Keep in mind , EVERYTHING where an exchange of money takes place ( inc. service , food , clothes , hospital bills , car inspection , medicine , even postage stamps ! )is taxed .

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